Now, I have had occasion to point out the accusation against me that I had not fairly outlined the Government which I for one would wish to see built up here [in Australia]. That accusation I think I have fairly disposed of by quoting a passage from the first letter I wrote on the subject. But I heard somebody, I think it was a prominent member interrupt me when I spoke of an Australian union having a privy council. “We want no privy council” the interruption was. It seems to me that that interruption clearly shows how little some hon. [honourable] gentlemen have thought on the subject. “We want no privy council,” said the voice. I shall proceed now to show that we do want this Privy Council. (Hear, hear.)

The Privy Council of England is the greatest embodiment of the executive power that I suppose is known in the world. It has grown up by a system of development through a thousand years, *from the time when the members of the council were the mere tools of the sovereign, until a time when they are the real advisers of the sovereign*. (Hear, hear.)

It has been developed into perhaps the most superior Executive Council in the world. I am going to show –

—and I think it is worth my while to be at this trouble—– *the difference* between the residence of the executive power in such a body as the Privy Council, of which our [Australian colonies’] executive councils are imperfect imitations, and the depository of the executive power in a single great officer, as in the United States of America.

Now, I hold in my hand a book published by a well-known lawyer [Henry C. Lockwood], a member of the New York bar; and I need not tell hon. gentlemen that some of the most distinguished lawyers of the United States are members of that great bar. The title of the book is “The Abolition of the President” [published in NY in 1884]. That will show that the question of the unwise arrangement of the exercise of the executive authority in the United States has not escaped attention and discussion.

In the first section, of the second article of that great document, the Constitution of the United States of America, the executive power is vested *absolutely* in the President of the United States; not vested with the advice of any body, but absolutely in the President of the United States. I am going to show this House how that power has been used, notably in the case of two presidents who reigned supreme in the United States each for eight years –

—I mean President Jackson and President Grant. I have had occasion on former opportunities to point out how *the really great men who framed the Constitution of the United States were largely guided by the type of the English Government in the arbitrary days of George III.* Close observers, close investigators, of the institutions of America have pointed this out time after time: that *the model before those illustrious men was the Government of Britain at its worst epoch, in the arbitrary days of George III.*

This writer [Lockwood] has this passage on the subject:

“That which stands out

——”

I am only quoting for the purpose of drawing a contrast between the means devised in England for the exercise of the executive power and the means devised in the United States for the same object.

The writer of this book sa

ys:

[Page 194]

“That which stands out more prominently than anything in American history is *the great similarity of our fundamental law with the ancient and obsolete theories of the Constitution of Great Britain.* The veto power of the President is no exception to this rule.

“The power of the two Houses of Parliament to frame laws was presumed to be held in check by the king’s negative, which could always be interposed to prevent the adoption of an unwise or unnecessary statute. Again, the arbitrary exercise of the king’s right of veto was itself restrained by the power which Parliament possessed of refusing a grant of supplies [tax and expenditure acts] for the service of the Crown.

“The Presidents of the United States have vetoed more than one hundred bills.

“The Crown in England has not vetoed a measure passed by the Legislature since the reign of Queen Anne [8 March 1702

– 1 May 1707], nor have the House of Commons withheld supplies from the Crown since the Revolution of 1688. Yet, in free America, both of the powers are exercised to-day, and the present Congress is hurling its anathemas against the President, who, in his turn, replies by veto after veto (1879).

“Congress proclaims that it will withhold the supplies if the President vetoes its measures. He does veto them, nevertheless. Here is conflict, antagonism. Who is going to yield? One must do so, or anarchy will ensue. Although the ancient theory of the veto was abandoned in England, it has survived with us. It was specifically introduced into our law. All of the Presidents since Jackson have regularly exercised it. Since the foundation of the Government, the veto power has been exercised by the Presidents of the United States about one hundred times.”

Well, now contrast the conditions in the two nations. The Bills which are carefully passed through the two Houses of Congress have in a hundred instances been vetoed by the Chief Magistrate in power; Bills similarly passed in England, never since the days of Queen Anne! Now, I am going to show how this veto power has been used in the United States, my object being to draw *sharper attention* to the wisdom of creating a Privy Council for Australia. I am particularly anxious that hon. members should hear this part of my case, because *it cannot well be understood without close attention*. General Jackson, who had two terms in the Presidential Chair –

—that is, for eight years he was a despotic sovereign, *more* despotic than any sovereign of Europe.

Mr. J. P. ABBOTT: It was the people who made him!

Sir Henry Parkes: No doubt. General Jackson in one of his veto messages to Congress, laid down this doctrine; remember, I am quoting from the message of the President conveying his veto on one of their Bills. He says:

“Each public officer who takes an oath to support the Constitution, swears that he will support it as he understands it, and not as it is understood by others.”

Daniel Webster among ,others strongly condemned the President, and thus spoke of it at the time:

—

“The general adoption of the sentiments expressed in this sentence would dissolve our Government. It would raise every man’s private opinion into a standard for his own conduct; and there certainly is, there can be no government, where every man is to judge for himself of his own rights and his own obligations. Where every one is his own arbiter, *force, and not law*, is the governing power. He may judge for himself, must execute his own decisions; and *this is the law of force*. I confess, sir, it strikes me with astonishment that so wild, so disorganising a sentiment, should be uttered by a president of the United States.”

Now, President Jackson, who, as I have just stated, was not only elected to the Presidency, but re-elected for another term of four years, did many things as arbitrary as this, and he was the sole depository of the executive power of the United States.

I now come to General Grant. General Grant was a man of a very different type, of a very different character. I admit that I am one of those who have a warm admiration for his great qualitities

[Page 196]

as a soldier and a patriot.

But General Grant did some things which nobody can possibly defend; and I only allude to them to show how, *in the best of men, this lodgment of sole power is sure to run into riot and abuse*.

This is what Mr. David Dudley Field, the great jurist, said of the conduct of General Grant:

“Under colour of his office alone, without any treaty or Act of Congress, or any judicial process, he seized and delivered up to Spain a Spanish subject who had sought shelter on our shores; and under colour of protecting a State against domestic violence, he turned out one Legislature, and put in another, in three of the States.” General Grant actually, by an armed force, turned out the elected members of the Legislature and put another body of men in their places. That was *the effect* of having the executive power of a State lodged in the hands of one man.

Charles Sumner, speaking also of General Grant, used these words:

—

“The President, without warning, precipitated upon the country an ill-considered scheme for the annexation of a portion of the island of San Domingo, in pursuance of a treaty negotiated by an aide-de-camp. Reluctant senators were subdued to its support, while treading under foot the Constitution in one of its most distinctive republican principles. The President *seized the war-power of the nation*, instituted foreign intervention, and capped the climax of usurpation, by menace of violence to the black Republic of Haiti.”

Now, I think these instances of how the executive power is used by the President of the great Republic, are quite sufficient to warn us, or to warn the men who are intrusted with the solemn and sacred duty of framing this [Australasian] Constitution, from taking any similar course of vesting the executive power of the State in the hands of one man. Hence, then it seems to me that the interruption which has drawn from me these references to the President’s power –

—it seems to me that the interruption of, “We want no Privy Council” was ill-considered, ill-timed, and was an expression of opinion which men, in their sober moments, would not adopt.

The highest provision in the machinery of a free State is to secure, under wholesome restraints and keen responsibilities, the exercise of the executive power. In all States whatever, the executive arm of Government is the most important, and it cannot be left out: it must be in existence. The power must reside somewhere.

In an autocracy, of course, it resides in the autocrat, and is exercised by his sovereign will; and it is little short of that, as I think I have proved, in the case of the Presidential Government of the United States, *which cannot be fairly called a republic*.

But under our [current English] form of Government, this power, whether in the [English] Privy Council or in the Executive Council of one of these great [Australian] Colonies, can only be exercised by the advice of men who are responsible for all advice they give; and I do not know how human wisdom can contrive any safer depository for the executive power of a free State. I therefore say that my outline which I gave on the 30th October last, namely, that there should be, under a [English] Governor-General, a Privy Council and a Federal Parliament, consisting of a Senate and a House of Representatives –

—is a fair outline of a Constitution.

===================================================

Note: The England

Parkes knew began to disappear after World War I. After World War II all that was left was Poodle UK.

Congress-skirting executive orders and similar presidential directives are less numerous and generally have less reach than laws.

But every president uses them and often tests how far they can go, *especially* in times of war and other crises.

Obama also has wielded considerable power in secret

He has carried forward Bush’s key anti-terrorism policies [= wars of aggression against Iraq and Afghanistan] and expanded the use of unmanned drone strikes against [it says here] terrorist targets in Pakistan and Yemen.

William Howell, a political science professor at the University of Chicago and the author of “Power Without Persuasion: The Politics of Direct Presidential Action,” isn’t surprised to see commandments coming at a rapid clip.